Please, Family Caregivers Do NOT Need Coloring Books

A publicist, attempting to link her client to National Family Caregivers Month, just sent me a pitch asking that I write about how an adult coloring book is a way “to relieve caregiving stress.” May I just say this? Family caregivers don’t need coloring books. What we need is help and money. Physical help, and real-life green dollar bills. We need someone to drive our loved ones to the doctor for us so we can go to work, to sit with us while we wait endless hours in hospitals, to bring over some meals or offer to fetch our kids from the school bus. We need professionally trained nurses to do what we are expected to do: clean ports, help with toileting and hygiene, dress wounds, treat bedsores, give injections, handle catheters and test blood for glucose. We need relief that someone other than us pays for. We don’t want to have to beg our adult siblings to help take care of Mom so that we can get a haircut. We don’t want to pay for adult day care so that we can watch our daughter in the school play. We need to be able to take a vacation, go away overnight, get away from our caregiving responsibilities and have time to ourselves.  We need the government to realize that at 34 million strong and growing every day, we are the nation’s largest unpaid workforce and should we ever revolt en masse, the country will be up the proverbial creek. We save the government $522 billion a year. Maybe we can actually get paid for some of our labor? We ne...
Source: Healthy Living - The Huffington Post - Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: news